February 09, 2015

Research Roundup: FDA Commissioner to step down, a Grand Challenge for neglected diseases, funding for reproductive health research and development, and more

In this regular feature on Breakthroughs, we highlight some of the most interesting reads in global health research from the past week.

US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) Commissioner Dr. Margaret Hamburg announced last week that she intends to resign from her position in March.
The FDA’s Chief Scientist Dr. Stephen Orstroff will serve as the interim Commissioner. Dr. Robert Califf, founding director of the Clinical Research
Institute at Duke University, and recently appointed deputy commissioner for Medical Products and Tobacco at the FDA, is expected to be the principal
candidate to fill the role permanently.

Policy Cures—an independent research group and author of the annual G-FINDER report which analyzes global spending on global health R&D—released
its first-ever report on reproductive health R&D for developing countries. The report reveals that just $88 million was spent on developing country-specific reproductive health R&D in 2013, $63 million of which was spent
on contraceptive R&D. The report explores the limited funding and major gaps in reproductive health R&D, highlighting the need for affordable
products that are easily delivered, administered, or stored; have multiple purposes; and do not have major side-effects.

A recent study reveals that the United Kingdom’s top 25 universities—in terms of public funding for medical research—spend just 1.7 percent of their health research budgets on neglected diseases. The London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine topped the list, spending 68 percent of their health research on diseases that impact people in
developing countries, however, all but 5 of the top 25 allocated less than 10 percent of their medical research budgets to neglected diseases.